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Background: Gut microbial alterations have been linked to chronic liver disease and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The role of the oral microbiome in liver cancer development has not been widely investigated. Methods: Bacterial 16S rRNA sequences were evaluated in oral samples from 90 HCC cases and 90 controls who were a part of a larger U.S. case–control study of HCC among patients diagnosed from 2011 to 2016. Results: The oral microbiome of HCC cases showed significantly reduced alpha diversity compared with controls (Shannon P = 0.002; Simpson P = 0.049), and beta diversity significantly differed (weighted Unifrac P = 0.004). The relative abundance of 30 taxa significantly varied including Cyanobacteria, which was enriched in cases compared with controls (P = 0.018). Cyanobacteria was positively associated with HCC [OR, 8.71; 95% confidence interval (CI), 1.22–62.00; P = 0.031] after adjustment for age, race, birthplace, education, smoking, alcohol, obesity, type 2 diabetes, Hepatitis C virus (HCV), Hepatitis B virus (HBV), fatty liver disease, aspirin use, other NSAID use, laboratory batch, and other significant taxa. When stratified by HCC risk factors, significant associations of Cyanobacteria with HCC were exclusively observed among individuals with negative histories of established risk factors as well as females and college graduates. Cyanobacterial genes positively associated with HCC were specific to taxa producing microcystin, the hepatotoxic tumor promotor, and other genes known to be upregulated with microcystin exposure. Conclusions: Our study provides novel evidence that oral Cyanobacteria may be an independent risk factor for HCC. Impact: These findings support future studies to further examine the causal relationship between oral Cyanobacteria and HCC risk.

Background Compression-extension injury with unilateral facet joint fracture is one of the most devastating injuries of subaxial cervical spine. However, it is not yet clear which fixation technique represents the optimal choice in surgical management. This study aims to assess the construct stability at the operative level (C4/C5 cervical spine) following anterior cervical discectomy and fusion (ACDF) alone and combined fixation techniques (posterior-anterior fixations). Methods A previously validated three-dimensional C2-T1 finite element model were modified to simulate surgical procedures via the anterior-only approach (ACDF) and combined cervical approach [(transarticular screw, lateral mass screw, unilateral pedicle screw, bilateral pedicle screw) + ACDF, respectively] for treating compression-extension injury with unilateral facet joint fracture at C4/C5 level. Construct stability (range of rotation, axial compression displacement and anterior shear displacement) at the operative level was comparatively analyzed. Results In comparison with combined fixation techniques, a wider range of motion and a higher maximum von Mises stress was found in single ACDF. There was no obvious difference in range of motion among transarticular screw and other posterior fixations in the presence of anterior fixation. In addition, the screws inserted by transarticular screw technique had high stress concentration at the middle part of the screw but much less than 500 MPa under different conditions. Furthermore, the variability of von Mises stress in the transarticular screw fixation device was significantly lower than ACDF but no obvious difference compared with other posterior fixations. Conclusions Of the five fixation techniques, ACDF has proven poor stability and high structural stress. Compared with lateral and pedicle screw, transarticular screw technique was not worse biomechanically and less technically demanding to acquire in clinical practice. Therefore, our study suggested that combined fixation technique (transarticular screw + ACDF) would be a reasonable treatment option to acquire an immediate stabilization in the management of compression-extension injury with unilateral facet joint fracture. However, clinical aspects must also be regarded when choosing a reconstruction method for a specific patient.

Background and Aim Chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection, long‐term alcohol use, cigarette smoking, and obesity are the major risk factors for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in the United States, but the disease risk varies substantially among individuals with these factors, suggesting host susceptibility to and gene–environment interactions in HCC. To address genetic susceptibility to HCC, we conducted a genome‐wide association study (GWAS). Methods Two case‐control studies on HCC were conducted in the United States. DNA samples were genotyped using the Illumian microarray chip with over 710 000 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). We compared these SNPs between 705 HCC cases and 1455 population controls for their associations with HCC and verified our findings in additional studies. Results In this GWAS, we found that two SNPs were associated with HCC at P, Genome‐wide association study (GWAS) showed that five SNPs in 22q13.31, three in PNPLA3 (rs2281135, rs2896019, and 4823173) and two in SAMM50 (rs3761472 and rs3827385), were associated with HCC in the United States.

Background The latest global cancer data from 2020 shows that breast cancer has replaced lung cancer as the number one cancer in the world. Searching for new biomarkers of breast cancer has important clinical significance for early diagnosis, prediction of prognosis, and targeted therapy. MicroRNA-21 (miRNA-21) can be used as a new molecular marker for early diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment of tumors. However, the expression of miRNA-21 in breast cancer and its prognosis are not clear. Therefore, this study conducted a meta-analysis to further clarify the relationship between the expression of miRNA-21 in breast cancer and prognosis. At the same time, we carried out bioinformatics analysis to further analyze the possible molecular mechanism of miRNA-21, so as to provide potential clinical indicators for the diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis of patients. Methods PubMed, Medline, Embase, Web of Science, Wanfang, Chinese Biomedical Literature Database, Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure, and other databases were used to retrieve the published relevant literatures. Include the eligible research, extract the survival data hazard ratios and 95% confidence intervals and other information. STATA16.0 software was used for meta-analysis. Download the miRNA data of breast cancer through the Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database and Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database. The data extracted for independent sample t test and ROC curve was drawn. OncomiR plotted the survival curve of miRNA-21 on the prognosis of breast cancer. The target genes of miRNA-21 were predicted, and the Gene Ontology (GO) function and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway were analyzed. STRING database and Cytoscape construct protein-protein interaction (PPI) network to obtain Hub gene. The correlation between the expression level of Hub gene in breast cancer and the abundance of immune cell infiltration was analyzed by TIMER database and verified by Kaplan-Meien plotter database. Results The results of this meta-analysis will be submitted to a peer-reviewed journal for publication. Conclusion In this study, meta-analysis and bioinformatics analysis were used to further explore the prognosis, mechanism, and related pathways of miRNA-21 in breast cancer. Ethics and dissemination The private information from individuals will not be published. This systematic review also should not damage participants' rights. Ethical approval is not available. The results may be published in a peer-reviewed journal or disseminated in relevant conferences. Osf registration number DOI 10.17605/OSF.IO/R32A9.

The organic Rankine cycle is introduced into the conventional ejector refrigeration (CER) system to establish the low-grade heat-driven cooling/power cogeneration ejector refrigeration (CPC-ER) system using the isobutane as the refrigerant. In comparison with the CER system where external power is consumed by the circulating pump, the power output from the CPC-ER system is more than the power consumption of its circulating pump so that a portion of net power is derived from the CPC-ER system. Based on the mathematical model of thermodynamics, energy and exergy analysis of the CPC-ER system is carried out and compared with the CER system. The results reveal that the equivalent coefficient of performance (COP) of the CPC-ER system is 41.14% to 71.30% higher than that of the CER system, and the exergy efficiency of the CPC-ER system is 1.32 to 1.49 times higher than that of the CER system. Both the power produced by the turbine and the total exergy output from the CPC-ER system approach the maximum, as the generating temperature in the generator is up to 80°C. The CPC-ER system has the higher energy utilization efficiency than the CER system, and it is suitable for the cooling and power-required places with low-grade thermal sources.

Purpose The Chinese Meropenem Surveillance Study (CMSS) was conducted every 2 years from 2010 to 2018 to monitor the antimicrobial activity of commonly used antimicrobial agents against nosocomial gram-negative bacilli in China. Methods From 2010 to 2018, 6,537 gram-negative bacilli were collected from 14 teaching hospitals. The minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) of meropenem and other antimicrobial agents were determined using the agar dilution and broth microdilution methods. Results Continuous surveillance indicated that, except for Klebsiella pneumoniae, the susceptibility of Enterobacterales to carbapenems was relatively stable over time. Carbapenems had the highest activity against the tested isolates, with MIC90 values (MIC for 90% of organisms) ranging from 0.032 mg/L to 8 mg/L. More than 90% of bacteria were susceptible to either meropenem or imipenem; more than 80% were susceptible to ertapenem. The prevalence of extended-spectrum beta-lactamase (ESBL)-producing E. coli, K. pneumoniae, and P. mirabilis each year was 50.4-64.3%, 18-41.2%, and 1.9-33.8%, respectively. The prevalence of carbapenem-resistant K. pneumoniae (CRKP) and carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii (CRAB) continued to increase significantly over time, from 7.6% to 21.2% and 64.6% to 69.3%, respectively. The prevalence of CRKP was higher from urinary tract infections (25.4%) than from bloodstream infections (14.2%), intra-abdominal infections (14.5%), and respiratory infections (14.4%). In total, 129 CRKP isolates were evaluated by PCR; of these, 92 (71.3%) carried the bla KPC-2 gene. Colistin maintained very high in vitro antimicrobial activity against P. aeruginosa and A. baumannii (more than 95% of isolates exhibited susceptibility at all timepoints). Conclusion The results indicate an increase in K. pneumoniae resistance to carbapenems over time, mainly owing to KPC-type carbapenemase production. A. baumannii was severely resistant to carbapenems in China. Ongoing MIC-based resistance surveillance, like CMSS, provides additional data for clinical anti-infective treatment.

PURPOSE: HCC incidence has been continuously rising in the US for past 30 years. To understand the increase in HCC risk, we conducted a case-control study in Connecticut, New Jersey and part of New York City. METHODS: Through rapid case ascertainment and random digit dialing, we recruited 673 incident HCC patients and 1,166 controls. Information on demographic and anthropometric characteristics, lifestyle factors, medical and family cancer histories, were ascertained through telephone interviews using a structured questionnaire. Saliva specimens were collected for testing hepatitis C virus (HCV) antibodies. Unconditional logistic regression models were utilized to calculate odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) to determine HCC associations with risk factors. RESULTS: The study confirmed that HCV infection and obesity were important risk factors for HCC, ORs=110 (95%CI: 59.2–204) and 2.13 (95%CI: 1.52–3.00), respectively. High BMI and HCV infection had synergy in association with elevated HCC risk. Patients both obese and infected with HCV had HCC detected on average nearly 10 years earlier than those with neither factor. Diabetes, cigarette smoking and heavy alcohol intake were all associated with increased risk of HCC, whereas aspirin and other NSAID use were associated with reduced risk. HCC cases tended to attain less education, with lower household incomes, unmarried, and to have had more sexual partners than the controls. CONCLUSIONS: Individuals at risk of HCC in the US comprise a unique population with low socioeconomic status and unhealthy lifestyle choices. Given the multifactorial nature, a comprehensive approach is needed in HCC prevention.

Non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) has attracted a great deal of interests due to its potential contributions to the 5th generation (5G) mobile networks. In this letter, a mutual-aid NOMA strategy, which aims to reduce the computational burdens at the near-end users and improve the coverage of the high quality service to the edge users, is designed for the cooperative networks. The performances of the outage probability and computational burden of the users in mutual-aid NOMA clusters are evaluated, respectively. The results show that the computing complexity and the coverage issues can be efficiently improved by using the cooperative mutual-aid NOMA.

The WW and C2 domain containing 1 (WWC1) gene encodes a protein named WWC1 (or KIBRA), which is involved in the Hippo signaling pathway. WWC1 is often lost in triple‐negative breast cancer and has been shown to suppress tumor metastasis. In this study, 470 breast cancer patients were recruited and WWC1 expression in the tumor samples was measured with quantitative reverse transcriptase PCR. Associations of WWC1 expression with breast cancer survival were analyzed using the Cox proportional hazards regression model and Kaplan–Meier survival analysis. The relationship between WWC1 expression and methylation was evaluated in a dataset from The Cancer Genome Atlas. Using our microarray data on gene expression and the Ingenuity Pathway Analysis, we predicted the WWC1‐associated signaling pathways in breast cancer. Our results showed that low expression of WWC1 was significantly associated with advanced‐stage diseases, high‐grade tumors, and estrogen receptor‐ or progesterone receptor‐negative status. Compared to those with high expression, patients with low WWC1 had higher risk of breast cancer relapse [hazard ratio (HR) = 2.06, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.26–3.37] and higher risk of death (HR = 2.76, 95% CI: 1.51–5.03). The association with relapse‐free survival remained significant after adjustment for disease stage, tumor grade, and hormone receptor status and was replicated in a public dataset. Analysis of high‐throughput gene expression data indicated that WWC1 was involved in the Hippo signaling pathway. Online data also suggested that DNA methylation was inversely associated with WWC1 expression. The study confirmed that low WWC1 expression was associated with aggressive breast cancer and poor survival outcomes.

Background/objective Osteoarthritis (OA) is the most common joint disorder. Angiogenesis and synovial hyperplasia are important factors in the development of OA. Previous studies demonstrated that bevacizumab, an antibody against vascular endothelial growth factor in angiogenesis for cancer treatment, might be a potential candidate for the treatment of OA. However, experimental studies were lacking in whether bevacizumab would be able to attenuate the severity of OA. In this study, we used normal New Zealand rabbits and a rabbit knee immobilization model of OA, to investigate the toxicity and efficacy of bevacizumab. Methods In the safety test of bevacizumab, sixteen rabbits were randomly divided into 2 groups: control group and bevacizumab group (n = 8 per group). We evaluated the blood chemistry and histology of normal rabbit joints after bevacizumab treatment. In the efficacy test of bevacizumab, thirty-two rabbits were used for establishing OA model and then randomly divided into 4 groups: bevacizumab group, sodium hyaluronate (SH) group, triamcinolone acetonide (TA) group and control group (n = 8 per group). We used histological evaluations and immunohistochemistry to examine the responses to bevacizumab treatment in a rabbit model of knee immobilization-induced OA. Results Bevacizumab treatment did not show any adverse effects histologically on normal joints. Blood tests and Mankin's score of cartilage revealed no significant difference between the bevacizumab and control groups (p > 0.05). The bevacizumab, SH, and TA groups attenuated articular cartilage degeneration and showed less synovial hyperplasia compared to the control group macroscopically and histologically, while the effect of the bevacizumab group was most obvious (p

Background: Acinetobacter baumannii colonizing the respiratory tract has been established as an independent risk factor for bacteremia. However, within-host evolution of A. baumannii in bacteremia has not been extensively investigated. Here we performed whole genome sequencing to discover the evolutionary characteristics that accompany the transition from respiratory tract carriage to bloodstream infection in three A. baumannii bacteremia patients.Results: Within-host genetic diversity was identified. A total of twenty-one SNVs were detected. Genic and intergenic evolution occurred particularly in secretion system, DNA recombination and cell motility genes. Intergenic SNVs occurred more frequently than synonymous and non-synonymous SNVs, which indicated potential transcription or translation regulation. Non-synonymous mutations mostly occurred during the transition from the respiratory tract carriage to the bloodstream infection. Isolates of clonal complex 208 (CC208) had lower substitution rate with approximately 10-6 nucleotide substitutions per site year-1, compared with non CC208 isolates (approximately 10-5). We found evidence for the occurrence of recombination in one patient. Gene content showed patient specificity, and isolates within a single host had constrained gene content diversity.Conclusions: Our results indicated that high within-host diversity was driven by rapid mutation rates and limited effect of recombination in A. baumannii from respiratory tract carriage to bacteremia.

Background With evidence of sustained transmission in more than 190 countries, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has been declared a global pandemic. Data are urgently needed about risk factors associated with clinical outcomes. Methods A retrospective review of 323 hospitalized patients with COVID-19 in Wuhan was conducted. Patients were classified into 3 disease severity groups (nonsevere, severe, and critical), based on initial clinical presentation. Clinical outcomes were designated as favorable and unfavorable, based on disease progression and response to treatments. Logistic regression models were performed to identify risk factors associated with clinical outcomes, and log-rank test was conducted for the association with clinical progression. Results Current standard treatments did not show significant improvement in patient outcomes. By univariate logistic regression analysis, 27 risk factors were significantly associated with clinical outcomes. Multivariate regression indicated age >65 years (P < .001), smoking (P = .001), critical disease status (P = .002), diabetes (P = .025), high hypersensitive troponin I (>0.04 pg/mL, P = .02), leukocytosis (>10 × 109/L, P < .001), and neutrophilia (>75 × 109/L, P < .001) predicted unfavorable clinical outcomes. In contrast, the administration of hypnotics was significantly associated with favorable outcomes (P < .001), which was confirmed by survival analysis. Conclusions Hypnotics may be an effective ancillary treatment for COVID-19. We also found novel risk factors, such as higher hypersensitive troponin I, predicted poor clinical outcomes. Overall, our study provides useful data to guide early clinical decision making to reduce mortality and improve clinical outcomes of COVID-19.

BackgroundWith evidence of sustained transmission in more than 190 countries, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has been declared a global pandemic. As such, data are urgently needed about risk factors associated with clinical outcomes.MethodsA retrospective chart review of 323 hospitalized patients with COVID-19 in Wuhan was conducted. Patients were classified into three disease severity groups (non-severe, severe, and critical), based on their initial clinical presentation. Clinical outcomes were designated as favorable and unfavorable, based on disease progression and response to treatments. Logistic regression models were performed to identify factors associated with clinical outcomes, and log-rank test was conducted for the association with clinical progression.ResultsCurrent standard treatments did not show significant improvement on patient outcomes in the study. By univariate logistic regression model, 27 risk factors were significantly associated with clinical outcomes. Further, multivariate regression indicated that age over 65 years, smoking, critical disease status, diabetes, high hypersensitive troponin I (>0.04 pg/mL), leukocytosis (>10 × 109/L) and neutrophilia (>75 × 109/L) predicted unfavorable clinical outcomes. By contrast, the use of hypnotics was significantly associated with favorable outcomes. Survival analysis also confirmed that patients receiving hypnotics had significantly better survival.ConclusionsTo our knowledge, this is the first indication that hypnotics could be an effective ancillary treatment for COVID-19. We also found that novel risk factors, such as higher hypersensitive troponin I, predicted poor clinical outcomes. Overall, our study provides useful data to guide early clinical decision making to reduce mortality and improve clinical outcomes of COVID-19.(Funded by the Natural Science Foundation of Hubei Province ZRMS2019000029 and the Top Youth Talent Program in Hubei Province.)

Jiangang Zhang, Chunjiang Zhao, Hongbin Chen, Henan Li, Qi Wang, Zhanwei Wang, Feifei Zhang, Hui Wang On behalf of the CARES Network Department of Clinical Laboratory, Peking University People’s Hospital, Beijing, China Objective: This study aimed to determine the risk factors for intra-abdominal infections (IAIs), assess the clinical outcomes of IAIs, and investigate the spectrum and antimicrobial resistance of major pathogens causing IAIs. Patients and methods: This prospective observational study enrolled patients from the Chinese Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance of Nosocomial Infections (CARES) program between 2007 and 2016. Data on the clinicopathological factors and causative pathogens were collected. The results of antimicrobial susceptibility tests were interpreted according to the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) interpretive breakpoints recommended by the Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute in 2017. Results: A total of 2,756 patients were included. The 30-day all-cause mortality was 9.5% (262/2,756). Multivariable analysis showed that the following independent risk factors were associated with the 30-day mortality: age >60 years, pulmonary disease, tracheal cannula, infection occurring in intensive care unit (ICU), prior admission within 3 months, antibiotic use before infection, recent use of immunosuppressants, and multidrug-resistant organisms. In addition, 2,913 clinical isolates were collected. The Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria accounted for 70.8% and 29.2% of all isolates, respectively. The most common pathogens were Escherichia coli (33.4%), Klebsiella pneumoniae (10.8%), and Enterococcus faecium (10.7%). Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Acinetobacter baumannii were the most common non-Enterobacteriaceae Gram-negative pathogens. E. faecium, Enterococcus faecalis, and Staphylococcus aureus were the most common Gram-positive pathogens. E. coli, A. baumannii, and Enterobacter cloacae were more commonly found in ICU patients than in non-ICU patients. Overall, the antibiotics tested in the CARES exhibited diminished susceptibility to pathogens over the study period, especially extended spectrum β-lactamase producing isolates. Conclusion: Considering the current data set and high-level resistance of intra-abdominal pathogens to various antibiotics, further monitoring of the epidemiology of IAIs and their susceptibility to antibiotics through the CARES is warranted. Keywords: intra-abdominal infections, risk factors, clinical outcomes, antimicrobial susceptibility, epidemiology

Applying the fault detection (FD) techniques to chiller is beneficial to reduce energy use in buildings and to enhance the energy efficiency of refrigeration plants. The purpose of this study is to propose an enhanced chiller FD method with higher accuracies for field applications by combining Bayesian network (BN) and principal component analysis (PCA). The key paths are as follows: first, the data space represented by the normal data is decomposed into two subspaces by the PCA, i.e., principle component (PC) subspace and residual (R) subspace; second, instead of PC subspace, the score matrixes in R subspace are used to develop the BN model. The performance of the proposed method is evaluated by using the experimental data from ASHRAE RP-1043. Test results show that the accuracies are significantly improved by 43% at most (for condenser fouling at Level 1), especially for these faults at slight severity levels.

From the perspective of field applications, a feature selection (FS) method is proposed in this study for chiller fault diagnosis (FD). First, the candidate existing features that can be retained (CRE-features) are nominated through the following criteria: high existent frequency of sensors installed on the field chillers, high sensitivity to faults and small amount of calculation. Then these features are evaluated by using an FD method based on a Bayesian network merged distance rejection (DR-BN) technique to remove redundant features. Second, when the expected performance cannot be obtained by only using these specifically retained existing features (RE-features), additional features need be included. Supplemental features (S-features) are nominated through the following criteria: low cost of measurement and high sensitivity to faults. Then these S-features are evaluated together with RE-features by using the same method to determine the specific S-features. The experimental data from ASHRAE RP-1043 are used to validate the FS method. Results show that the proposed FS method is effective for chiller FD, and can make the matched FD method perform well by selecting the commonly available features in the field and by supplementing a few features with low cost of measurement to indicate faults.

Solar absorption refrigeration (SAR) system occupies large building energy consumption, due to its low generation efficiency. Depending on the mechanism of enhanced disturbance and convection, this paper proposes the application of ultrasound heat-transfer enhancement technology in the boiling heat-transfer of LiBr/H2 O solution in the generator to enhance system performance. At present, there are few theoretical and experimental studies about the ultrasound on heat-transfer enhancement in the salt solution, especially in the field of multi-frequency ultrasound (MFU) bubble dynamics. The motion of a cavitation bubble has significant impact on the disturbance and convection in the solution. Thus, the mathematical models of cavitation bubble dynamics (CBD) are constructed to evaluate the solution cavitation characteristics, the CBD on boiling heat-transfer in the generator is investigated, and the effect of the number of ultrasonic vibrators (UVs) on the cavitation bubble radius (CBR) is investigated to explore the cavitation characteristics of MFU. The results indicate that: the low-frequency ultrasound on the heat-transfer in vacuum generator is more obviously effect, due to enhance solution mixing around the heating surface; the maximum CBR could be increased by increasing the number of UVs, while the maximum CBR is increased by no more than 1% at the number of UVs of 24–25 and the total sound intensity of 1 W/cm 2, respectively; the solution in vacuum generator could produce transient-cavitation with MFU. This study, not only reaffirms the benefit of using the MFU for generator of SAR system, but also provides some rules of the cavitation characteristics of MFU.

The main aim of this research is to forecast airport performance using grey system model GM(1,1), and evaluate efficiency of airport performance using robust but flexible approach (DEA), and incorporating traditional indicators as well as new constraints. Particularly it shows and compares the efficiency evolution of the 5 busiest Asian airports (China’s Beijing Hong Kong Shanghai, Japan’s Tokyo and Dubai) until 2020, under several constraints, based on multidimensional tool: Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). We use Frontier Analyst Professional software to get the results of analysis. The results evidence how DEA approach seems to be a very promising method to evaluate efficiency of airport performance.

False alarm rate (FAR) is an important evaluating indicator when chiller fault detection and diagnosis (FDD) system is applied on site, and higher FAR will not be accepted by users and manufacturers. When we use Bayesian network classifier (BNC) to operate FDD process, it is hard to keep the FAR within an acceptable range when the class node contained the normal operating condition. So a practical chiller FDD methodology is proposed. At first, a probabilistic boundary limit under the normal operating condition is integrated in the BNC to reduce the FAR in chiller FDD process. Then, we add the site information to the BNC to solve the problem that missed detection rate (MDR) rises caused by the reduction of FAR. Evaluation of the methodology was made on a 90-ton water-cooled centrifugal chiller reported in ASHRAE RP-1043. The results show that the FAR decreases from 22.7% to 4.7% after integrating the probabilistic boundary, and the MDR of refrigerant overcharge and refrigerant leakage decreases from 27.6% and 9.4–7.6% and 4.5% respectively after adding the site information.

The solar absorption refrigeration technology plays a major role in the building energy saving and emission reduction. According to the concept of energy cascade utilization, this paper proposes a novel solar absorption/dual compression hybrid refrigeration (SADC-HR) system, which consists of solar-driven single effect absorption refrigeration (SSAR) subsystem and power-driven dual-source dual-compression refrigeration (PDCR) subsystem. An air-cooled compression refrigeration (ACR) cycle is integrated with the water-cooled compression refrigeration (WCR) cycle to make up the PDCR subsystem, so as to satisfy the all-weather space cooling/heating demand. The SADC-HR system achieves the cascade production and utilization of cold energy for the temperature and humidity independent control air conditioning system. The thermodynamic model of the SADC-HR system is built to evaluate the system performance and operating parameters, and the comparisons with two conventional systems are also discussed. The results indicate that there are optimum generating temperature of 70 °C and optimum evaporating temperature of 18 °C for the SSAR subsystem to obtain the lowest power consumption at low solar intensity of 450 W/m2. The SADC-HR system also exhibits better economic performance, and its solar collector area is respectively 55.79% and 34.75% lower than that of the conventional SSAR system and solar absorption-compression cascade refrigeration (SA-CCR) system at low solar intensity of 450 W/m2. In addition, the proposed system shows the better energy-saving performance as well as a smaller environmental impact, whose power consumption is reduced by 61.47% compared with the conventional SA-CCR system at solar intensity of 800 W/m2, and the present case study demonstrates that total seasonal electricity consumption in the SADC-HR system decreases a value of 25.32% which corresponds to a decline of 21580.66 kg of CO2 emission in comparison with the conventional ACR system.

Background Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) strains are a major threat to global health. The development of effective control measures requires more detailed phenotypic and genotypic characterization of CRE. Methods CRE isolates were collected from 65 hospitals in 25 provinces across China between January 1, 2012, and December 31, 2016. The isolates were characterized by antimicrobial susceptibility testing and multilocus sequence typing. Genes encoding carbapenemases, mobilized colistin resistance (mcr-1), and β-lactamases were detected by polymerase chain reaction and DNA sequencing. Results A total of 1801 independent CRE isolates (1201 Klebsiella pneumoniae, 282 Escherichia coli, and 179 Enterobacter cloacae) were collected during the study period. Overall, 96.9%, 89.7%, 54.5%, 49.9%, and 40% of CRE strains were susceptible to colistin, tigecycline, amikacin, minocycline, and fosfomycin, respectively. Notably, 1091/1201 (91%) K. pneumoniae, 225/282 (80%) E. coli, and 129/179 (72%) E. cloacae harbored carbapenemase gene. K. pneumoniae carbapenemase (KPC) was predominant in K. pneumoniae (77%), whereas New Delhi metallo-β-lactamase (NDM) was predominant in E. coli (75%) and E. cloacae (53%). The mcr-1 gene was detected in 13 NDM-carrying E. coli isolates (4.6%). Sequence type (ST)11 and ST167 were predominant among the 100 K. pneumoniae and 47 E. coli STs, respectively. KPC-ST11, which accounted for 64% of K. pneumoniae isolates, had higher levels of resistance than non-ST11 strains to aztreonam, fosfomycin, and amikacin (P < .001). The proportions of KPC and NDM enzymes in CRE increased from 2012 to 2016 (54%-59% and 12%-28%, respectively). Conclusions The number of CRE strains harboring carbapenemase is increasing. KPC-ST11 K. pneumoniae, the predominant strain, shows a reduced susceptibility to most available antibiotics.

Due to intermittent and uncertainty natures of solar energy, the conventional solar absorption-compression cascade refrigeration (SA-CCR) system cannot meet the all-weather cooling/heating demand when solar inputs are insufficient. In this work, a novel SA-CCR system with an integrated air-cooled vapor compression refrigeration (ACR) cycle is proposed. It is coupled of two subsystems: a solar-driven single-effect absorption refrigeration (SSAR) subsystem and an electricity-powered dual-source vapor compression refrigeration (EDCR) subsystem. The two subsystems are cascaded by one evaporative-condenser. The following improvements are achieved by the novel system: (i) the efficiency and the time of solar energy utilization are respectively improved and extended dramatically; (ii) the all-weather cooling/heating demand is met by coupling an ACR cycle to the EDCR subsystem. The proposed system is applied to a building located in Zhengzhou city to evaluate its cycle and economic performance. On a basis of different grade energy, i.e., thermal and mechanical energy, the novel SA-CCR system with an integrated air-cooled compression cycle is respectively compared with the conventional SSAR and ACR systems. The results show that the whole cooling season power (energy) consumption is reduced by 26.70% as compared to the conventional ACR system, and that the proposed system has the better economic performance than the two conventional SA-CCR systems.

The conventional nonorthogonal multiple access (NOMA) strategy has secrecy challenge in coordinated multipoint (CoMP) networks. Under the secrecy considerations, this paper focuses on the security-based NOMA system, which aims to improve the physical layer security issues of conventional NOMA in the coordinated multipoint (NOMA-CoMP) networks. The secrecy performance of S-NOMA in CoMP, that is, the secrecy sum-rate and the secrecy outage probability, is analysed. In contrast to the conventional NOMA (C-NOMA), the results show that the proposed S-NOMA outperforms C-NOMA in terms of the secrecy outage probability and security-based effective sum-rate.

To evaluate the in vitro antimicrobial activities of biapenem, arbekacin, and cefminox against different gram-negative bacterial isolates in China, a total of 100 non-duplicated Escherichia coli, 100 Acinetobacter baumannii, 100 Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and 99 Klebsiella pneumoniae isolates were collected from 6 teaching hospitals in China in 2012. The minimal inhibitory concentrations (MICs) of biapenem, arbekacin, cefminox and 13 other antibiotics were determined by the broth microdilution method. The carbapenems (biapenem, meropenem, and imipenem) exhibited high antimicrobial activity against E. coli (98%) and K. pneumoniae (≥95%), followed by colistin and amikacin. The MIC50 and MIC90 of biapenem against E. coli were ≤0.06 mg/L and 0.25 mg/L, respectively. For K. pneumoniae, the MIC50 and MIC90 of biapenem were 0.25 mg/L and 1.0 mg/L, respectively. The MIC50 and MIC90 of cefminox against E. coli were 1.0 mg/L and 4.0 mg/L, respectively. The resistance rates of A. baumannii to most of the antibiotics were more than 50%, except for colistin. Amikacin was the most active antibiotic against P. aeruginosa (97%), followed by colistin (93%). The MIC50 and MIC90 of arbekacin against P. aeruginosa were 2.0 mg/L and 8.0 mg/L, respectively. In conclusion, carbapenems, colistin, amikacin, and arbekacin exhibited high antimicrobial activities against gram-negative bacteria, except A. baumannii.

Objective To evaluate the potential benefits of systemic pelvic and para-aortic lymphadenectomy in endometrioid uterine cancer patients. Methods We conducted a retrospective study on 244 cases of endometrioid uterine cancer that involved surgery in the Center of Gynecologic Oncology, Peking University People's Hospital, Beijing, from January 2000 to May 2008. We conducted staging for each case to ensure accordance with FIGO 2009 surgical staging criteria. Clinical data, including histology, age at diagnosis, surgical procedure, adjuvant therapy, date of death or last follow-up, and date and sites of recurrence were collected for each patient. Results Among 244 endometrioid uterine cancer patients, 207 cases (84.8%) underwent systemic pelvic lymphadenectomy. Among these cases, pelvic lymph nodes in 17 cases (8.2%) exhibited tumor metastasis. Systemic aortic lymphadenectomy was performed in 127 cases (52.0%) among 244 total patients. Five cases (3.9%) exhibited positive aortic lymph nodes, of which four exhibited positive pelvic lymph nodes. We investigated the impact of positive retroperitoneal lymph nodes on staging: 4 (4/161, 2.5%), 6 (6/29, 20.7%), 6 (6/35, 17.1%), 1 (1/8) and 1 (1/6) case changed to stage IIIc from stage Ia, Ib, II, IIIa, and IIIb, respectively. Tumor-free and overall survival did not differ between patients who underwent pelvic lymphadenectomy or not (P > 0.05). Tumor-free survival improved in stage Ib pelvic lymphadenectomy patients (P = 0.040); para-aortic lymphadenectomy did not improve patient survival in all stages (P > 0.05). Conclusion Systemic lymphadenectomy is not warranted in stage Ia endometrioid uterine cancer.

Objective Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) are a class of non-protein coding transcripts that has gained significant attention lately due to their important biological actions and potential involvement in cancer. Ovarian cancer is a devastating disease with poor prognosis, and our understanding of lncRNA's involvement in the malignancy is limited. To further our knowledge, we measured the expression of three lncRNAs, ASAP1-IT1 , FAM215A , and LINC00472 , in tumor samples, and analyzed their associations with disease characteristics and patient survival. Methods Two hundred sixty-six patients diagnosed with primary epithelial ovarian cancers were recruited for the study. Fresh-frozen tumor samples were obtained from the patients at tumor resection and analyzed by RT-qPCR for expression of ASAP1-IT1 , FAM215A , and LINC00472 . Associations of lncRNA expression with patient survival were determined using Cox proportional hazards regression models. Results We observed high expression of ASAP1-IT1 , FAM215A and LINC00472 more frequently in low grade tumors and early stage disease compared to high grade tumors and late stage disease, respectively. High expression of ASAP1-IT1 and FAM215A were associated with favorable overall survival, and the survival association with ASAP1-IT1 was independent of tumor grade and disease stage. Analyses of online data also demonstrated similar survival associations with ASAP1-IT1 and FAM215A , suggesting that these lncRNAs may be involved in ovarian cancer progression. Conclusions LncRNAs may play appreciable roles in ovarian cancer and more research is needed to elucidate their biological mechanisms and clinical implications in tumor characterization as well as disease prognosis and treatment.

Glutathione S-transferase P1 (GSTP1) is involved in a wide range of detoxifying reactions. Any alteration in the structure, function, or expression of GSTP1 gene may alter the ability of a cell to inactivate carcinogens or mutagens, and thus modify an individual's risk to cancer. Previous epidemiological studies on the potential association between GSTP1 Ile105Val polymorphism and breast cancer risk have produced inconsistent results. In order to drive a more precise estimation of this association, we performed a meta-analysis of 30 published case-control studies including 15,901 cases and 18,757 controls. Crude odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were used to assess the strength of the association. The results of this meta-analysis showed that GSTP1 Ile105Val polymorphism was not associated with breast cancer susceptibility in overall population. However, in subgroup analysis by ethnicity, we found a significant association among Asian population (for Val/Val vs. Ile/Ile: OR 1.27, 95% CI 1.02-1.83; for the recessive model Val/Val vs. Ile/Ile + Ile/Val: OR 1.42, 95% CI 1.20-1.69). When stratified by study design, significantly elevated susceptibility to breast cancer was found among hospital-based studies (for Val/Val vs. Ile/Ile: OR 1.38, 95% CI 1.16-1.63; for recessive model Val/Val vs. Ile/Val + Ile/Ile: OR 1.31, 95% CI 1.12-1.55; for dominant model: Val/Val + Ile/Val vs. Ile/Ile: OR 1.10, 95% CI 1.02-1.19). In conclusion, our meta-analysis suggests that GSTP1 Ile105Val polymorphism may increase susceptibility to breast cancer in Asian population.

Proto-oncogene HER2 (also known as erbB-2 or neu) plays an important role in the carcinogenesis and the prognosis of breast cancer. Many epidemiological studies have been conducted to explore the association between the HER2 Ile655Val polymorphism and breast cancer risk. However, inconsistency existed in the results. Therefore, we performed a meta-analysis of 27 published case–control studies including 11,504 cases and 12,538 controls. We assessed the strength of the association by crude odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) and reached a result that HER2 Ile655Val polymorphism was associated with an increased breast cancer risk in overall populations (for Ile/Val vs. Ile/Ile: OR = 1.05, 95% CI = 1.00–1.12, P = 0.07 for heterogeneity; for the dominant model Ile/Val + Val/Val vs. Ile/Ile: OR = 1.10, 95% CI = 1.01–1.20, P = 0.01 for heterogeneity). In subgroup analysis by ethnicity, we found a significant association among Africans (for Val/Val vs. Ile/Ile: OR = 8.78, 95% CI = 1.94–39.72, P = 0.35 for heterogeneity; for the recessive model Val/Val vs. Ile/Val +Ile/Ile: OR = 8.60, 95% CI = 1.92–38.48, P = 0.31 for heterogeneity) and Asians (for Ile/Val vs. Ile/Ile: OR = 1.18, 95% CI = 1.01–1.39, P = 0.41 for heterogeneity; for the dominant model Val/Val + Ile/Val vs. Ile/Ile: OR = 1.18, 95% CI = 1.01–1.38, P = 0.27 for heterogeneity). In conclusion, our meta-analysis suggests that HER2 Ile 655Val polymorphism may contribute to breast cancer risk.

NBS1 gene plays an important role in DNA repair. Many epidemiological studies have investigated the association between NBS1 8360G > C polymorphism and breast cancer, however, the results are still controversial. Therefore, we performed a meta-analysis of 10 case-control studies. Crude odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were used to assess the strength of the association. The results showed NBS1 8360G > C polymorphism contributed to breast risk in overall populations (for CC vs. GG: OR = 0.75, 95% CI = 0.74-0.98, P = 0.13 for heterogeneity; for the recessive model CC vs. GG/CG: OR = 0.88, 95% CI = 0.77-1.00, P = 0.44 for heterogeneity). In subgroup analysis by ethnicity, no significant association was found in all genetic models. In summary, our meta-analysis strongly suggests the NBS1 8360G > C polymorphism is associated with breast cancer.

The Catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) plays an important role in the development of breast cancer. Many previous epidemiologic studies explored the association of COMT Val158Met polymorphism with breast cancer susceptibility. However, the results were inconsistent. We therefore performed a meta-analysis of 26 published studies including 16,693 breast cancer patients and 18,261 healthy controls. Crude odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were used to assess the strength of the association of the COMT Val158Met polymorphism with breast cancer risk. No significant association was found in all genetic models in overall, Asian, European populations. After the studies whose genotype frequencies in the controls did not fulfill Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium were excluded, we found a borderline significant decreased breast cancer risk among Europeans (for the recessive model LL versus HH/HL: OR = 0.90, 95% CI = 0.90–1.00, P heterogeneity = 0.33). There was no between-study heterogeneity. In conclusion, COMT Val158Met polymorphism may be a low-penetrant risk factor for breast cancer development in European population.

Separated Function Radio Frequency Quadrupoles (SFRFQ) structure is a new post accelerator of RFQ, the higher accelerating efficiency and transmission make it become a proper choice for the post acceleration after the integral split ring RFQ (ISR RFQ)-1000 accelerator at Peking University [Y.R. Lu, J.F. Guo, W.G. Li, et al., Nucl. Instr. and Meth. A 420 (1999) 2]. A novel design strategy is proposed in this paper to avoid the sparking problem and decrease the energy spread at the exit of SFRFQ. Correspondingly, a code SFRFQCODEV1.0 was developed specially for beam dynamic simulations and error studies. A prototype cavity with 14 accelerating gaps has been constructed and tested at low and high RF power successfully. The operating energy region of SFRFQ structure and the results of error study are presented.

Purpose: The PALB2 gene has an essential role in BRCA2-mediated DNA double-strand break repair and intra–S phase DNA damage checkpoint control, and its mutations are moderately associated with breast cancer susceptibility. This study was designed to investigate the common variants of PALB2 and their association with breast cancer risk. Experimental Design: Four single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP; rs249954, rs249935, rs120963, and rs16940342) which tagged all 19 of the reported SNPs (minor allele frequency >0.05) covering PALB2 were selected and genotyped in 1,049 patients with breast cancer and 1,073 cancer-free controls in a female Chinese population. Results: Based on the multiple hypothesis testing with the Benjamini-Hochberg method, tagging SNPs (tSNP) rs249954, rs120963, and rs16940342 were found to be associated with an increase of breast cancer risk (false discovery rate–adjusted P values of 0.004, 0.028, and 0.049, respectively) under the dominant model. tSNP rs249954 was associated with a 36% increase of breast cancer risk [adjusted odds ratio (OR), 1.36; 95% confidence intervals (CI), 1.13-1.64; P = 0.001; TT/TC versus CC genotypes]. The adjusted OR for rs120963 was 1.25 (95% CI, 1.04-1.49; P = 0.014; CC/CT versus TT genotypes). For rs16940342, the adjusted OR was 1.21 (95% CI, 1.02-1.45; P = 0.037; GG/GA versus AA genotypes). Based on an additive model, tSNPs rs249954 and rs120963 were associated with an increase of breast cancer risk (P = 0.005 and 0.019; respectively), with the false discovery rate–adjusted P values being 0.020 and 0.038, respectively. Conclusions: Our data suggest that the variants of PALB2 confer low-penetrance breast cancer susceptibility in a Chinese population.

Prolonged estrogen exposure is believed to be the major cause of endometrial cancer. As possible markers of estrogen exposure, various menstrual and reproductive features, e.g., ages at menarche and menopause, are found to be associated with endometrial cancer risk. In order to assess their combined effects on endometrial cancer, we created the total number of menstrual cycles (TNMC) that a woman experienced during her life or up to the time of study and two genetic risk scores, GRS1 for age at menarche and GRS2 for age at menopause. Comparing 482 endometrial cancer patients with 571 population controls, we found TNMC was associated with endometrial cancer risk and that the association remained statistically significant after adjustment for obesity and other potential confounders. Risk increased by about 2.5% for every additional 10 menstrual-cycles. The study also showed that high GRS1 was associated with increased risk. This relationship, however, was attenuated after adjustment for obesity. Our study further indicated women with high TNMC and GRS1 had twice the risk of endometrial cancer compared to those low in both indices. Our results provided additional support to the involvement of estrogen exposure in endometrial cancer risk with regard to genetic background and lifestyle features.

This study investigated the antimicrobial susceptibilities of Streptococcus pneumoniae, Haemophilus influenzae and Moraxella catarrhalis isolates causing adult community-acquired respiratory tract infections (CARTIs) in China. A multicentre resistance surveillance study (CARTIPS) investigating 1046 clinical isolates from 19 hospitals in China was conducted from 2013 to 2014. Based on the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) breakpoints of oral penicillin, the percentages of penicillin-resistant, penicillin-intermediate and penicillin-susceptible S. pneumoniae were 44.1%, 13.7%, and 42.2%, respectively. The rates of penicillin-non-susceptible S. pneumoniae ranged from 27.9% to 72.2% in different cities, with the highest rate in Nanchang. Macrolides, including azithromycin, clarithromycin and erythromycin, showed the lowest activities against S. pneumoniae isolates, with resistance rates of 90.5%, 92.2% and 93.0%, respectively. However, 98% of these strains were susceptible to levofloxacin and moxifloxacin. For H. influenzae isolates, most of the antimicrobials agents exhibited good activities. However, ampicillin and trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole showed relatively lower activity against H. influenzae, with resistance rates of 35.0% and 54.4%, respectively. β-lactamase production rates amongst H. influenzae and M. catarrhalis were 31.0% and 87.1%, respectively. In addition, a total of 15 β-lactamase-negative ampicillin-resistant (BLNAR) strains identified in this study were resistant to ampicillin, amoxicillin/clavulanic acid, cefaclor and cefuroxime. Most of the antimicrobial agents showed excellent activity against M. catarrhalis, with susceptibility rates of >90%. The results from the current study confirmed the regional variations in antimicrobial susceptibility of major CARTI pathogens and provided some choices for the treatment of these organisms. Continuous national surveillance of the epidemiology of CARTIs is strongly warranted in China.

Background Among all neurological tumors, tumor incidence of the neuroepithelial tissue is the highest, where 50% are gliomas. Treatment for gliomas has traditionally included surgery and adjuvant therapy. With advancements in medicine, gene therapy has entered the clinical setting, in which control of tumor growth, tumor volume and decrease of supply of blood to the tumor have been observed. Rat hyperplasia suppressor gene (rHSG) has been proven to inhibit the injury-mediated proliferation of vascular smooth muscle cells. Methods A recombinant adenovirus, Adv-rHSG-GFP, was constructed and characterized by in vitro and in vivo studies. The function of rHSG on cell proliferation was determined in vitro by 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide (MTT) exclusion assay and plate clone formation, while a C6/Sprague Dawley rat glioma model was established to observe the effect of rHSG in vivo. Results Overexpression of rHSG displayed a strong effect on suppressing C6 cells proliferation in vitro and growth of glioma in vivo, which suggests the use of rHSG as a possible treatment strategy for glioma. p21Cip1, p27Kip1 and proliferating cell nuclear antigen were found to be involved in the tumor suppression mechanism of rHSG. Conclusions rHSG can markedly inhibit of the growth of rat glioma cells. The suppression mechanism of rHSG may be related to cell cycle regulation, which shows that rHSG is a potential therapeutic target of glioma tumor. This preclinical study supports a further in-depth study on the effect of rHSG on cell proliferation, migration and change in the extracellular matrix component of glioma cells.

HAWQ, developed at Pivotal, is a massively parallel processing SQL engine sitting on top of HDFS. As a hybrid of MPP database and Hadoop, it inherits the merits from both parties. It adopts a layered architecture and relies on the distributed file system for data replication and fault tolerance. In addition, it is standard SQL compliant, and unlike other SQL engines on Hadoop, it is fully transactional. This paper presents the novel design of HAWQ, including query processing, the scalable software interconnect based on UDP protocol, transaction management, fault tolerance, read optimized storage, the extensible framework for supporting various popular Hadoop based data stores and formats, and various optimization choices we considered to enhance the query performance. The extensive performance study shows that HAWQ is about 40x faster than Stinger, which is reported 35x-45x faster than the original Hive.

Energy efficiency diagnosis in heat pump operating is a necessary means to ensure that the heat pump has energy-efficient operation, but existing conditions of field operational date collection and collected date accuracy are always bottlenecks for field date collection. This paper presents the basic criteria of field date collection and determines what parameters are needed for energy efficiency diagnosis in heat pump operating, based on the first law of thermodynamics and basic principle of heat transfer. These parameters include evaporation/condensation pressure of refrigerant in heat pump system; temperature, pressure, and flow rate of water entering/leaving the evaporator; temperature, pressure, and flow rate of water entering/leaving the condenser; and power consumption of the heat pump/water pump. Combining the experience of date collection from some fields and the technical demands measuring basic parameters, the authors of this paper present the comprehensive method combining the online in situ instruments with necessary portable instruments for the field measurement and also provide the criterion of date collection validity. Taking a typical heat pump system as case study, we describe a general date collection method and implementation steps in this paper. The results show that the method proposed in this paper is simple and effective.

This paper reports the fabrication, measurement and discussion about the nanosolenoid inductors for high frequency applications as much as 40 GHz, taking advantage of a much smaller size compared with traditional microinductors. Three small size nanosolenoid inductors are fabricated, such as a nanosolenoid inductor with a diameter of 4.8 μm, pitch of 10 μm, length of 22 μm. The nanohelix inductors are fabricated using focused ion beam stress introducing technology based on nanobeams, which are obtained by etching the aluminum deposited on SOI substrate. With different focused ion beam fabrication conditions, such as implementing does, etching number, we get different sets of nanosolenoid inductors with different pitches, diameters and solenoid turns. The inductor and quality factor of the nanohelix inductor vary with frequency. The inductanc decrease from 9 pH to an inductance smaller than 1 pH, when the frequency changes from 100 MHz to 40 GHz. And the quality factor of the nanosolenoid inductor first arises from 0.1 at 100 MHz to 0.3 at about 2 GHz, then the quality factor slightly decreases, at last it will arise to about 1.4 at 40 GHz.

This paper describes a microhelix inductor structure fabricated with focused ion beam(FIB) stress introducing technology(SIT). With the decrease of the implantation does, the pitch and the diameter of the microhelix inductors decreases, which will also affect the performance of the microinductors. Microhelix inductors with different scales are fabricated from 120 nm thick, 2 um wide, 41um long aluminum microbeams, which are built on SOI substrate. The solenoid microinductor is fabricated with implantation does 2.83×1017cm-2. With different scales of microbeams and fabrication does, we get a microsolenoid inductor with pitch 6 um, diameter 2.3 um. So under the control of different FIB condition, we can get the desired microhelix inductor with needed pitch, diameter and turn number. The fabrication process is controllable and repeatable. We get the S parameters of the microhelix with the help of Agilent network analyzer from 100 MHz to 40 GHz at an interval of 50 MHz, after open structure and through structure deembedding process, the calculated inductance is as small as 10-4 nH, Quality factor arises from 0.02 to 0.55 when the frequency arises from 100 MHZ to 40GHZ respectively.

This paper reports the use of dual-microcantilevers coupled by cruciform overhang to enhance the mass sensitivity for minor mass detection. Driven by a piezoactuator in air, each cantilever of the structure can resonate in two different modes (in-phase and out-of-phase modes), and the resonant amplitude-ratios are compared before and after a mass adding. Using this sensing strategy, the cross-shaped overhang of the coupled system, by weakening the coupling effect between the two cantilevers, provides two orders of magnitude enhancement in mass sensitivity without scaling down the cantilevers.

Traumatic pulp exposure can bring about some permanent damages to tooth tissues including dental pulps. This study was designed to evaluate the effects of traumatic pulp exposure on the osteo/odontogenic capacity of dental pulp stem cells (DPSCs).Rat incisors were artificially fractured and dental pulps were exposed to the oral environment for 48 h. Then, multi-colony-derived DPSCs from the injured pulps (iDPSCs) were isolated. Their osteo/odontogenic differentiation and the involvement of NF-κB pathway were subsequently investigated.iDPSCs presented a lower proliferative capacity than normal DPSCs (nDPSCs), as indicated by MTT and FCM assay. ALP levels in iDPSCs were significantly higher (P0.01) than those in nDPSCs. Alizarin red staining revealed that iDPSCs exhibited an increased capacity of calcium deposition. Moreover, iDPSCs expressed stronger osteogenic markers (Runx2/RUNX2 and Ocn/OCN) and less odontogenic gene/protein (Dspp/DSP) than nDPSCs in vitro. In vivo transplantation showed that nDPSCs implants generated the typical dentine-pulp complex while all iDPSCs pellets formed the osteodentin-like tissues which were immunopositive for OCN. Mechanistically, iDPSCs expressed the higher levels of cytoplasmic phosphorylated IκBα/P65 and nuclear P65 than nDPSCs, indicating an active cellular NF-κB pathway in iDPSCs. After the inhibition of NF-κB pathway, the osteogenic potential in iDPSCs was significantly down-regulated while odontogenic differentiation was up-regulated, as indicated by the decreased Alp/Runx2/Ocn and uprised Dspp expression.Pulp exposure for 48 h decreased the odontogenic capacity and enhanced the osteogenic potential of DPSCs via the NF-κB signalling pathway.

A novel method is proposed to determine the carrier-envelope phase (CEP) of a relativistic few-cycle laser pulse via the central frequency of the isolated light generated from Thomson backscattering (TBS). We theoretically investigate the generation of a uniform flying mirror when a few-cycle drive pulse with relativistic intensity ($I > 10^{18} {{\rm{W}} \mathord{/ {\vphantom {{\rm{W}} {{\rm{cm}}^{\rm{2}}}}}. \kern-\nulldelimiterspace} {{\rm{cm}}^{\rm{2}}}}$) interacts with a target combined with a thin and a thick foil. The central frequency of the isolated TBS light generated from the flying mirror shows a sensitive dependence on the CEP of the drive pulse. The obtained results are verified by one dimensional particle in cell (1D-PIC) simulations.

Multi-core comes to be the mainstream of processor techniques. The data-intensive OLAP relies on inexpensive disks as massive data storage device, so the enhanced processing power oppose to I/O bottleneck in big data OLAP applications becomes more critical because the latency gap between I/O and multi-core gets even larger. In this paper, we focus on the disk resident OLAP with large dataset, exploiting the power of multi-core processing under I/O bottleneck. We propose optimizations for schema-aware storage layout, parallel accessing and I/O latency aware concurrent processing. On the one hand I/O bottleneck should be conquered to reduce latency for multi-core processing, on the other hand we can make good use of I/O latency for heavy concurrent query workload with multi-core power. We design experiments to exploit parallel and concurrent processing power for multi-core with DDTA-OLAP engine which minimizes the star-join cost by directly dimension tuple accessing technique. The experimental results show that we can achieve maximal speedup ratio of 103 for multi-core concurrent query processing in DRDB scenario.

N-acetyltransferase 2 (NAT2) gene encodes a key enzyme involved in the metabolism of xenobiotics and whose polymorphisms have been related to individual susceptibility to several malignancies. Although many epidemiological studies have explored the association between NAT2 genetic polymorphism and lung cancer risk, the results remain controversial. In order to assess the overall relationship between NAT2 polymorphism and lung cancer risk, we performed a meta-analysis including 3945 lung cancer cases and 6085 controls from 19 published studies which were selected from 29 articles identified by a search of PubMed up to 1st June 2010. Crude odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were used to assess the association. No significant association was found in overall analysis (OR=1.02, 95% CI=0.90-1.16, P=0.01 for heterogeneity) and in subgroup analyses by ethnicity, sex, histological type, smoking status and study design. In conclusion, this meta-analysis found little evidence of an association between the NAT2 polymorphism and the risk of lung cancer.

CCND1 plays a critical role in cell cycle control and may contribute to head and neck cancer. We performed a meta-analysis of eleven case-control studies that examined the association between CCND1 G870A polymorphism and head and neck cancer risk. Overall, no significant association of this polymorphism with head and neck cancer was found (for AA vs. GG: OR=0.96, 95% CI=0.59-1.58, P

Hospital-acquired pneumonia (HAP) is among the most common of nosocomial infections and is associated with prolonged hospitalizations, increased medical expenses, and increased mortality (1, 2).…

The SULT1A1 R213H polymorphism is suggested to be implicated in the development and progression of breast cancer. However, the published findings are inconsistent. We therefore performed a meta-analysis of 8,454 breast cancer cases and 11,800 controls from 14 published case–control studies. We used odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) to assess the strength of the association of the R213H polymorphism with breast cancer risk. Overall, our results suggested that there is no significant relationship between SULT1A1 R213H polymorphism and the risk of breast cancer. However, further ethnic population analysis revealed a significantly increased risk of breast cancer for HH allele carriers among Asians (for HH vs. RR: OR = 2.27, 95% CI = 1.11–4.63, P heterogeneity = 0.63; for the recessive model: OR = 2.03, 95% CI = 1.00–4.41, P heterogeneity = 0.62). Taken together, this meta-analysis suggests that the SULT1A1 R213H may be a low-penetrant risk factor for developing breast cancer in Asian population.